A Powerful Multimedia Machine

You watch movies and TV shows on your PC. You use it to stream music. It's your game console and your videoconferencing center. Yet your PC has one major flaw, and that's its sound—tinny and weak at lower volumes, buzzy and rattling when you crank it up. Dolby Home Theater v4 solves the problem of PC audio performance with a suite of technologies that finally make your PC sound like the powerful multimedia machine that it is.

Dolby pioneered high-quality audio first in the recording studio and at the movies and then in the living room. Dolby Home Theater v4 benefits from decades of experience in areas like noise reduction, speaker optimization, and surround sound. It's a complete solution and improves audio performance whether you choose to listen through your PC's built-in speakers, your favorite pair of headphones, or by connecting your PC to a home theater system.

The Challenge of PC Audio

Understanding how Dolby Home Theater v4 works requires understanding the problems inherent in PC audio. These originate in both the quality of the source material and the playback process.

Typical problems with sources include:

Dull sound and unintelligible dialogue on user-generated content

Wildly varying volume levels from one source to the next

Content not produced in surround sound

The small speakers and underpowered amplifiers required to fit into the physical design of PCs create other problems. These include:

Irregular frequency response with no highs or lows

Unnatural, colored sound

Volume levels that are typically not loud enough

Distortion and annoying mechanical vibrations when sound is turned up

The Dolby Home Theater v4 Solution

Designed into a PC, Dolby Home Theater v4 first applies processing that fixes any problems with the source material. It then fixes playback issues by compensating for mechanical constraints of the PC itself.

Because Dolby engineers custom-tune each PC model that includes Dolby Home Theater v4, the audio processing ensures that you enjoy optimal sound for the specific combination of speakers and amplifier in your PC.

Dolby Home Theater v4 technologies:

Use our latest and most advanced algorithms

Draw on our extensive research into how people perceive sound

Match human audio perception

Are built on a common processing framework

Work together intelligently

Looking for Drivers?

Dolby does not have audio drivers available for download. Check out this list of partner sites where you can download audio drivers.

Dolby Home Theater v4 for Professionals

A comprehensive suite of technologies, Dolby Home Theater v4 dramatically improves audio performance in PCs and makes connecting to a home theater easier.

PC Manufacturers

Give consumers the high fidelity they've always wanted from their PCs.

Dolby Home Theater v4 for Professionals

Give consumers the high fidelity they've always wanted from their PCs. Easy to implement and integrate, Dolby Home Theater v4 technologies correct problems with source audio and optimize audio for the playback system.

Adjusting Audio for the Playback System

Useful for any type of content, Volume Maximizer boosts the audio signal by as much as 12 dB so users can turn up the volume without causing noise or clipping.

Custom-calibrated for specific PC models, Audio Regulator eliminates or reduces noise caused by the combination of overdriven speakers and amplifiers.

Surround Virtualizer creates a surround sound experience of stereo or multichannel content over a PC’s built-in speakers or any pair of stereo headphones.

Audio Optimizer improves the frequency response of a PC’s built-in speakers so content sounds truer to the artist’s original intent.

Dolby Digital Output converts all PC audio to Dolby Digital signals, allowing users to connect a PC to their home theater system with an HDMI® or S/PDIF cable.

Compare Dolby Home Theater v4 Features

Dolby Home Theater v4 is one of two Dolby technology suites that are part of the Dolby PC Entertainment Experience v4. Dolby Advanced Audio™ v2 is designed to deliver a personal surround sound experience.